Futurity as Healing

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“Futurity is an action; it’s practice. The actions we take today enact our relatives’ futurity: We both live out the futurity architecture of our ancestor relatives and frame a futurity for our future relatives.” - Laura Harjo 

Below is an excerpt from a study that explored the healing experiences of Minoritized student survivors in higher education with space and place on college campuses. Indigenous and other critical scholars teach us about Futurity. Indigenous Futurism can be defined as an intergenerational, relational, and holistic tool to process and heal multifaceted forms of trauma while actively building and creating a world that centers Indigenous values, spirituality, wellness, and joy. Minoritized student sexual violence survivors are healing for themselves, their ancestors, and their descendants. They are using the past and present to enact change for future students and campus survivors now. Utilizing Indigenous Research Methods and Felt Theory, Gizelle (a pseudonym) teaches us how nature and relationships are healing in many ways: 

It was a sunny afternoon as I was running to meet Gizelle in person on campus for the first time. I had met her over Zoom the previous week and was excited to learn about her healing space. I had just escaped a near head on collision with a student on a scooter (on their way to or from class I imagined), while walking through a student resource tabling fair in the quad. Walking through a building hallway, I arrived at the hidden campus garden. Winded and out of breath, I sat down on a bench overlooking a pocket of greenery. The garden was surrounded by enormous trees, branching and hovering over students laying on the grass. Some reading their books on blankets and others eating their afternoon snacks. On the bench, I laid my head back to look at the sky, grounding myself into the space. Tracing the clouds of different shapes, I took a deep breath. Feeling a gust of chilly wind shoot up the back of my neck and hearing a strong rumbling as the wind pushed the tree branches, I told myself I had arrived at a special place. A pocket of earth, soil, fresh air, and a stillness hidden away from the campus chaos and traffic. I offered a prayer of gratitude. 

As I looked down from the sky, I noticed Gizelle’s bright pink crocheted top as she walked up to me. Gizelle’s dangling flower earrings were beautiful, a representation of her Indigenous and Mexican identity. As a first-generation, sixth year student, Gizelle looks to be familiar with the garden as if she has spent a lot of time here. We find a patch of grass and sit. As we begin to converse, the world around us disappears and it is just the two of us in the garden. Immersed in the elements, she fidgets with her fingers and pulls at the frays of her ripped jeans. She begins to tell me about her experiences as a Queer Student of Color on campus. Gizelle shares with me the deep psychological and emotional impacts of a sexual assault she experienced her first year on campus. Diagnosed with PTSD and other mental health conditions, Gizelle took several leaves of absence to recover, heal, and regain a sense of self. She has persisted and shares with me that she will not give up on her academic aspirations. 

Her healing place is a garden situated away from the campus chaos and away from a campus culture that reminds her of “that past experience.” As I sat with her, I watched as the wind pushed a strand of hair into her eyes, she smiled and giggled as she tucked it behind her ears. She gets lost in her thoughts for a moment, in a faraway gaze she looks across the garden in silence. Her gentle, kind voice tells me that this garden and its inhabitants teach her how to take care of herself. They allow her to remember and feel connected to her parents' garden and trees back home, a connection back to her abuelitos [grandparents] home. The sun teaches her about taking in the sun so that her skin and Vitamin D deficiency can take in medicine. The sounds of birds and stillness in the garden allow her to regulate, slow down, whisper, and help her heart slow down. As she says this, I realize what she means. I hadn’t noticed how many students had left the garden. “Being in community with another living thing (plants and trees), teaches and reminds me to tend to myself,” she shares. Gizelle used to come here often after her experience of violence, a ritual. After leaving campus and now returning to finish her last course, her goal is to reclaim her belonging to this campus. The institution harbors a painful history for her, but nature has taught her otherwise. As she looked around the garden, she shared,

"Being a survivor, all you have is yourself sometimes. A lot of the time we are reduced to our bodies, sometimes, you'll resent your body, and you'll feel like it's not yours. But I think connecting with nature, connecting with this space and other campus survivors, you’re feeling like you're not limited to your body." 

I ask her how she feels now and what healing and this place means for her. She shares, 

" Now I walk about standing up straight, feeling comfortable taking up space, versus years ago. But even some days still, I don't. Some days I'll just want to hide. But it’s been about feeling comfortable in my own skin. I tell myself, I belong here." 

We spent another hour in the garden. She pointed out and taught me patiently about the different flowers that were falling amid a chilly winter on campus. I learned many things about Gizelle, the garden, its inhabitants, and its healing power that day.